The Day I Turned Brown

I still could not believe I had collected 9 thousand dollars in scholarships and somehow managed to get 2 more thousand from my own work to go to China!

But there I was, with a large suitcase, a small one, and a backpack at the Salt Lake City Airport.

I had arrived a little early, apparently. No one else from the group was at the spot we had all agreed to meet. After one hour, one by one, each student arrived, carrying the same amount of luggage as me.

And suddenly, there they were: the professor, his wife, his five kids, 3 boys, 2 girls, all between 6 and 14 years old, and grandma.

The professor's mother-in-law had joined our trip, and spoiler, she became one of the funnest people to be around. Something about her not really giving a fuck about all the craziness this trip was about to be was very comforting.

She mainly stayed with Thomas, the youngest student in the group and, conveniently enough, her grandson. He was nice, kinda, but very odd in my eyes.

The whole trip, I tried to understand him and how he connected so well with the others. For sure, he was gay, closeted like me, but different from me, trying to hide it, acting very straight, and proclaiming to have a girlfriend. He just acted weird and a little aloof from everything.

Like a bimbo, I would say.

Like one of those stereotypical dumb blonde characters. The kind that is such a joke itself that no one would bother to make fun of it.

Different from me.

I was no fun, playful, or in the joke ever, which made me a full meal for the bullies on the trip to make fun of me.

But that's more for later, in another entry.

Here we all were, ready to check in and embark on what was about to be the longest flight of my life.

15 hours inside a plane can make someone go pretty crazy, or, like me, start to become self-aware of everything in the group and start to get annoyed at each one of them.

But little did I know that the annoyance was just the beginning of what was about to be the biggest cultural shock of my life.

And I am not saying the cultural shock of being in Asia. No, that was actually the easy part.

What made that trip too hard for me was being with white, wealthy, Mormon, young Americans.

That was an experience itself I never, even if I try, will forget.

“Ok, everyone is here. I have everyone's tickets. I'm going to hand them out, but first, we need to take our first official picture!” said Professor Johnson.

We all staggered into roles the way 20-something people do to fit in the picture.

There I was, standing in the back, as a casually taller person, and then I heard:

“Sam, can you go to the front, please?”

I looked back. Didn't really understand why he was asking, but moved to the front.

We flew to Hong Kong, and then to Beijing.

“Everyone, today is going to be the hardest day of the trip! Because we are going to try to stay awake all day to get used to the new time zone.

We left on the 22nd of May and today is the 24th already! How crazy is that!?”

Said Professor Johnson with a fun but seemingly forced smile on his face.

“24th already?” I said quietly to Ashley next to me.

She said yes. We left late on the 22nd, flew 15 hours, and passed through 16 time zones.

“It's my birthday then,” I said.

She looked at me with much less excitement than I expected and wished me happy birthday, only touching my shoulders.

A small, very small act that started to show me I was traveling with people who were raised, educated, and acted so differently from me.

“It is Sam's birthday, everyone!” she said, and a few turned to me just to do the same thing as her.

Wish me happy birthday with a tap on my shoulders.

Our van arrived, and instead of going to a hotel, we went straight to what I would say was the number one attraction of the entire trip, out of the gate.

The Wall of China!

Professor J knew what he was doing. The most exciting attraction of the entire trip, on the day we were the most tired. The excitement was so high that for at least 6 hours, we forgot we were exhausted.

Walking up and down those steep, rocky stairs wasn't easy, and to make the hard situation funny, I guess, Nate and Dallin, two of the cute, popular-looking boys of the group, started to make fun of all the other boys with their circles of sweat right on our butthole area.

Although everyone was laughing, that humor was tough for me to swallow. I hate embarrassing others for laughs, and it reminded me so much of the bully boys from high school that Nate and Dallin honestly felt like they were barely out of it.

Once we were all down the wall, ready to go get some food at the local Chinese restaurant, another unforgettable, out-of-the-gate experience we would never forget, Professor J asked for another group photo.

And this time, he put his arms around my shoulders and kind of guided me to the front with him.

I had those weird sweat marks all over my shirt and, of course, on the shorts, between the crotch, and did not want to be in front.

I removed his arm and told him I was going to the back. He looked at me with a look I could not understand, but I didn't say anything.

Something was off.

After lunch and a tour of the city, we arrived at the hotel, and before going to the rooms, Professor J explained that at each hotel we would be assigned a different person to share a room with.

That would allow us to get to know each other better and not get sick of each other too quickly.

Hearing that was a nightmare. I couldn't imagine having to share rooms with any other boy who wasn't Austin. He was the only one I felt comfortable with, and I didn't have to pretend too much to be straight around him.

Not because he was gay or anything, but because Austin was in his own little world from the very first meeting we had for this trip.

He had served his mission in an Asian country, and since then, had made it very clear he was going to use this trip to find his Asian girlfriend and future wife.

Right off the bat, he put his plan into action. On the first flight, he asked the flight attendant for her phone number, getting a funny look and a loud-and-clear rejection from her.

He did not care, though. He continued hitting on girls at the airport, at the premium lounge, in lines, at restaurants, and on the street.

He was never invasive or assaulting anyone, but he was borderline weird to be around, haha. Which I loved. The attention was all on his actions and not mine.

Before we all headed up to our rooms, Professor J wanted to take another photo. And before he could try to place me in the front again, I just did it myself.

I didn't want him to try again and make another awkward situation.

After the picture was taken, he came to me and said, “Thank you, it is very important that you are visible and happy in our photos.”

I did not understand what the fuck he meant by that. But if he was trying to sound nice and polite, he missed the tone of it, because it sounded dark and twisted.

That same night, surprisingly, I received a message from Alyssa, the girl who introduced me to that study abroad program.

She asked if everything was going okay and told me that if I had any questions, I should always ask. And I did.

I said everything was going fine, the Wall of China was a great call for the first day, and probably one of the best experiences for my bday. And then, easing into it, I asked her why Professor Johnson wanted me to be in the front of every picture.

And just a few seconds later, I got an audio. No text, not a happy birthday. But a long 5-minute audio.

An awkward hello at the beginning, and she went straight to the point.

“Well, Sam, I thought you had caught this since the beginning when I approached you. But let me make it clear to you. You may have noticed that all your colleagues there are white Americans. Since the program started, and in many study abroad programs at BYU, the majority, if not all, of the students who go are white and wealthy kids.

Last year I was taking one of Professor Johnson's classes and he asked me if I was interested in going. I had the same answer as you: I am just a poor student. And then he helped me get all the scholarships, like I did for you. In years, I was the first person of color to go.

After the trip, Professor J said that it was extremely helpful for the university to maintain the study and to continue funding it. BYU has been trying to show more diversity, and if students are traveling around the world carrying the name, they value the diversity in their groups.

She paused. Four seconds of silence in her audio seemed like an eternity. And then she said:

“How do you think Professor J pays for him, his wife, and all five kids? It is all funded.

We are the lifeline for this to continue, and for him to continue to take this family around the world without paying.

All because we are brown.”

She ended her audio with those words. Never said anything again for the rest of my trip.

I understood my place there.

At first, I thought I was using the university's money, the 7 thousand for my pleasure and exploration, when they were actually profiting a lot more just from my presence there.

And once again, as white as I thought I was, I turned brown. Again.

The first time was when, at 16 years old, on my very first day I set foot in Utah to be an exchange student, the very first sentence I heard from an American person was:

“Hello, Sam, nice to meet you. Wow, look at you, so handsome with your gold, tan, brown skin.”

Even if in Brazil I am white, registered on my birth certificate as white, seen as white, and treated like white, in the US I was a tan, gold, brown person. Not brown in the Black skin spectrum, but right into the Latino one.

And I say all of this with the utmost ease. I like my skin tone. Unfortunately, because I am a privileged man in Brazil, I never really had to think much about it until that privilege traveled with me to the United States.

But within that group of people, I was considered the biggest diversity. Especially in China, it felt like that was where I became “non-white” once again.

Not only because I needed to be centered and visible in every group photo, but also the complete opposite, as I walked around the streets with the group and became completely invisible to the Chinese people.

Everywhere we went, Chinese people would pull out their phones and, without asking for permission, take pictures of the white students. Some were even approached like celebrities to take pictures together. Especially the ones with extremely fair skin, like Mia, and the blond, blue-eyed ones, like the Carter brothers.

And as for me, without saying a word, Chinese people would hand me their phones, signaling for me to take their pictures.

And I say all of this knowing that I am still extremely privileged. A white, tan person. Don't get me wrong. I know what I look like.

But so priviledge it took me a while to understand and internelzie what had been happening to me, but I'm so glad if finally happened.

In this surreal and unusual experience, I understood how my skin tone and my background could be used as a tool and a source of profit for some, while at the same time, I could be completely insignificant and invisible to others.